Mingle
by thir13enth
Summary: "Desperation doesn't suit you." Misaki/Hei


**Hey Hei, you, you! I don't like your girlfriend!...okay, sorry, that was perhaps a bit peppier than I thought it would be. Well actually, I guess that would prepare you for the rather fluffy peppy-ness of this one-shot. I had a bit of caffeine.**

**Oh, just to let you guys know in advance, I have a habit of typing 'friend' instead of 'fried', so…apologies in advance. xD I looked over the document but I might have missed a few 'n's.**

**Enjoy.**

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><p>After a long day at work, Misaki Kirihara was famished.<p>

Sweeping her long brown hair back into an even neater ponytail than it already was tucked away in, she pushed up her glasses to get a better look at the Chinese take-out menu.

According to the scale, she had gained a quarter of a kilogram over the past week. That was not good.

She was slipping.

Weight maintenance was just a matter of moving as much as eating. It seemed that the past week, she had been sitting around a bit more than usual.

But damn it, she was hungry and there was nothing but ramen at home.

Mentally crossing out anything with the term 'sauce', 'fried', 'sweet', 'crunchy', 'creamy', 'golden', 'glazed', 'thick', 'oily', and even 'classic', she whittled her choices down to one lone healthy item on the menu: steamed broccoli, carrots, and tofu with fried rice.

"Plain rice, please," she asked, after ordering. "Only a little bit!"

_What a shame_, she thought, looking down at her measly plate in comparison to what she saw on everyone else's tables, sitting down at a two person table on the corner.

Everyone else was enjoying their sweet-and-sour chicken, mu shu duck, sautéed baby bak choy, eggplant in garlic sauce, roast pork, egg foo young, teriyaki chicken with cashew rice, fried dumplings—

Li-kun?

Why did she always coincidentally bump into him? Small world after all? Fate? Destiny?

_Tsch, look away, _she told herself, and turned back to her vegetable mix. She didn't have the time to be thinking about him. She had only enough time to eat dinner before she had to get back on her case.

She didn't understand why she practically obsessed over him anyway. He was just a foreign exchange student that she probably wouldn't be seeing ever again once he went back to China. And besides that, she had her own life to deal with and so did he—he probably didn't even consider her as much as she did him.

One time acquaintances. That was all.

Except that she kept noticing him more and more. And kind of wishing he would notice her more and more.

_Concentrate on the tofu, Misaki, _she reprimanded herself, but while stirring her chopsticks around in the rice, found her gaze moving upwards to steal another peek at the dashing black-haired man, who was eating—well, shoveling—food into his mouth with nimble grace.

Only Li Shenshung could make pigging out look _so_ endearingly cute.

She followed one fried dumpling into his mouth before tearing her eyes away. The food he was eating looked just as good as he did, sitting there humbly by himself at two tables, one of which he had temporarily pulled over to make room for the excessive amount of food he was about to inhale.

Kawaii. She couldn't suppress the smile that crept up onto her ever so stern face.

Not wanting to admit to even herself that she was smiling because of a young college student, she crammed some broccoli into her mouth and slowly chewed, though she found that she was suddenly terribly conscious of how she looked with her mouth full.

But surely, Li wasn't looking—was he?

She stole another look but then whipped her eyes in the direction of the people behind him when he almost caught her stare. She made herself look pensive and waited until, through her peripheral vision, she saw he returned his attention to his dumplings. Then she watched him again, afar, admiring his intake of sustenance.

At least, before he looked up again at her.

This time, her head was resting on her hand and she couldn't quite turn away so quickly, so he caught her this time, and recognizing her brown eyes, smiled at her.

Okay, she had to stop playing eye-tag and eat.

She smiled back at him and resumed dinner.

Seriously, she had to stop—oh god, he was looking at her again.

Misaki resisted the urge to meet eyes with him and focused on the oddly shaped carrot on her plate, rolling it around with her chopsticks before eventually picking it up.

The steamed carrot slipped off her chopsticks when suddenly a sheet of white and blue sided up next to her, a plate of fried dumplings—god, they looked so unhealthily delicious—landed on the table surface just in front of her rice.

"L-Li-kun!" she suddenly exclaimed, and by instinct, stood up to greet him.

He appeared to be startled, but smiled sheepishly and explained, "You didn't have to get up. I just wanted to ask if I could join you. But I mean, if you want to stand, that's completely—"

She apologized and told him she was standing out of habit, and then warmly invited him to have a chair.

_Misaki. You have no self-control, _she thought, and then later told her self-consciousness to shut the hell up so that she could hear Li's voice.

They had a small brief chat, and the entire meantime, she kept her eyes on his dumplings so that she wouldn't blush at the sight of his handsome profile.

"How was your day?"

"Fine, and yours?"

"Good, not very stressful."

She popped another carrot into her mouth, but found that she couldn't quite eat comfortably with him right there in front of her. He probably thought she was health conscious, and that she would disapprove of his large portions, but that wasn't true at all!

Misaki couldn't help but look over her watch for a moment to check the time.

"Oh, do you have to leave?" he inquired softly.

Normally she would have spent the rest of the night hanging out with Li-kun just like she had that other fun night, but…just not today while she was eating healthy food. If she had ordered something like honey-glazed barbeque ribs from the beginning, she would have, but she just didn't want to embarrass herself by eating…rabbit food.

"Uh…yeah," she excused herself, quickly tossing her plastic fork into the tray and pushing the cover closed on it. "Just a bit busy tonight."

"Oh, okay."

Was that disappointment in his voice!

Her heart skipped a beat.

"Well, I mean, we can always hang out another day or something," she laughed nervously, acting as though she was nonchalant about future plans when at heart, she was really trying to persuade him to pick another day—perhaps when the night before she hadn't gained a few, and wasn't eating something boiled or steamed.

She quickly picked up her things and got up out of her chair to leave.

But before she turned around to speed away, his left hand reached out to her.

"Wait, before you go," he added, and she stopped while he—oh god.

His left hand was over her left bicep, arm wrapped around her upper body in some kind of a half-embrace, crushing her body against his warmth where she could smell the fresh light clean smell of laundry soap coming off his white shirt, a button neglected at the top to softly expose the skin at the base of his neck and collarbone (oh don't even get her _started _about his collarbone!).

Her face was centimeters away from his, and she found herself staring into deep midnight blue orbs like the night sky, noses about to bump into one another, mouths close enough to let their breaths mingle.

"What? Why?" she squeaked, never expecting herself to be so _near _him, heart racing, heat falling up her face, her mind barely able to think or process anything.

"Desperation doesn't suit you," he smoothly whispered, tuned down to a deep bass, eyes shaded gently under a mop of sleek black hair, alluring musk wafting off a few strands that came dangerously close to tickling her forehead.

The shivers that ran down her spine matched the rumble of his voice she felt against his chest.

She couldn't believe that any of this was happening. One minute she was worrying about unhealthy food and the next she was cradled up in the arms of a foreigner who she had been very late to admit to herself that she was infatuated with.

"I-I don't—" but realized that she couldn't lie her way out of a deep red flush that spread over her fair face and the clear message that was written across her enamored eyes.

"Shh," he whispered, and completely under his control, her tongue settled, and her lips shut, but were left slightly parted, obviously receptive. "Close your eyes."

Hypnotized by his charm like a snake ensnared by a flute, she did, hearing her heart in her ears.

He was going to kiss her? Oh god, she truly and sincerely wished that she didn't have the aftertaste of broccoli on her tongue. Why today of all days?

"Open your mouth," he coaxed, voice even softer.

She was cursing at her unfortunate meal choice and cursing at her unexpected luck for the moment. She couldn't believe that she was coming to this realization—she thought she was completely invulnerable to love and those types of emotions that she had always found time-wasting and meaningless: she _wanted _this.

She had just never understood how _much _she wanted this—this try, this attempt, this experiment at being in love.

"Wider," and his voice was barely audible.

Her eyes closed, she could only sense the heat radiating from his face as it neared hers.

How did this man have the ability to pry her open and unlock her? How it was that he brought her down to her knees and incapacitated her to even think? How did he know how to plant himself into her fondest memories? How—

And then—contact.

His lips were soft and moist, but the force behind them was firm and passionate. He, within the next moment, slid into her mouth and she could taste the remnants of fried dumpling off his—

No wait.

This _was _a dumpling!

A dumpling?

"Mmfph," she said, mouth full of food. Her eyes snapped open and she saw his furrowed eyebrows and a poised chopstick by her lips.

"You've been staring at the dumplings for a long time. You didn't ask for them yourself, and I thought you might want one," he explained briefly.

"Urghff," she replied, mouth still stuffed, a deeper blush spilling over her face when she realized that her previous thoughts were misleading. Oh god, she felt so exposed, even though she never actually admitted anything to him…

A small smirk played off his lips—and his voice once again dropped to a low, almost seducing, voice:

"Kirihara-san, don't tell me I have to _chew_ for you as well."

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><p><strong>Well. Not sure where that idea came from.<strong>

**It's probably also best if you tell me what you think of it! :D**

**thir13enth**


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